For anyone who would like to experience all of Hansard's estimable gifts in a single listening session, he has thoughtfully provided a compendium of his patented brilliance on Didn't He Ramble. [No. 124, p.56]

This album finds Patton in his glory. [No. 120, p.55]

The sound here is languid and lo-fi, even when it's rocking. [No. 123, p.61]

Nelson and co-composer Buddy Cannon work magic on cocky self-assurance mixed with self-deprecation and the glory of womanhood in a manner befitting this wordsmith's living-legend status. [No. 101, p.56]

Few of Creed's peers pursue songs and sounds this blazingly epic and weirdly experimental. [No. 112, p.53]

It's jauntier, if still jaundiced, and contains some of Gainsbourg's best compositions. [No. 138, p.57]

The Hope Six Demolition Project is yet another remarkable PJ Harvey effort. [No. 130, p.54]

[Runner] is something more akin to Eliot Smith, but airier, and with more synth. [No.92 p.58]

While Gibson is often humane, she's not always gentle. [No. 130, p.57]

I Am A Problem still explores texture and discomfort like Wolf Eyes always has, but now have riffs. [No. 126, p.60]

Much of the LP will be familiar to anyone who caught them on the road last year, but songs that curled into smoky haze onstage come into sharp focus here. [No.92 p.61]

It's not an easy listen--"Greener Stretch" is one of the rare songs that has an immediate hook--but it commands, and rewards, attention. [No. 147, p.61]

A collection that's at once futuristic and timeless, Across The Multiverse is sure to wow friends, family and followers alike. [No. 145, p.57]

Finds the group farther afield than ever from the playful, energetic randomness that made its first records so utterly fantastic. [#52, p.88]

A catchy rock record steeped in intelligent social and personal commentary that incorporates pedal and lap steel with great cowpunk results. [#60, p.119]

Elements of glam, power pop and soul creep into the Tyde's pool of sound, making for a winning, genre-spanning formula. [#60, p.117]

A total triumph. [#50, p.82]

There are hard and soft edges all over Every Country's Sun, and both accounts have made us happy campers. Again. [No. 146, p.56]

Give Up is a record that says, well, nothing. [#58, p.100]

Dirty Pictures (Part 1) is the perfect appetizer to the boozy, bluesy world of Low cut Connie. [No. 144, p.55]

By keeping the songs a little shorter, and by bandleader Gustav Ejstes not being such a musical ball hog this time around, Dungen has made a record that’s far more sophisticated musically and melodically.

He dips into that well [roots/Americana] again on The Westerner, with producers Howe Gelb and Dave Way opening up the sound with layers of guitar effects that create a dark, spacey atmosphere. [No. 131, p.55]

Post Pop Depression comes across like a third Pop partnership with Bowie, only more brutal and more elegiacally touched by the shadows of the smiles in Pop's memory. [No. 130, p.56]

Enthralling music that embraces you like your mama never did. [#69, p.87]

These guys do so many things well--now if they could only find their weird again. [No. 95, p.52]

The album is singularly that of Ono's deliciously odd aesthetic. [No. 102, p.59]

Tweedy is a certified master of the simple, effective melody--time and again, he's built something grand from the pieces of something small, and trace evidence of this trick is splattered all over Schmilco. [No. 136, p.60]

Though it isn't as catchy or streamlined as Lifestyle, one of Italian Platinum's many strengths is the continued ability of bassist Tim Midgett and guitarist Andy Cohen to pen lyrics that are downcast yet inspirational, witty yet insightful, sometimes all at once. [#55, p.86]